Silver Spoon and the Jack Muh Lantern
by Pre-Animation Man
Summary: Sugarcoat, who cares for Silver Spoon while her parents work in the field, warns the young slave girl about a monster, known from long-told tales, who comes out on Halloween


Once upon a time, when the great mountains were high, before they were pebbled apart into the sandy beach that we are standing on today, before today's present time of laughter, there was a time of great tears. Tears that ran so full and so deep that rivers were made that still flow. In this time of tears, our fathers' fathers' father and mothers' mothers' mother worked rain-wet and sun-dry, sunup to sundown. Each rising sun meant another hard day.

In this hardest of hard times there was still joy because there were children, children with round cheeks and round curls. Such a child was Silver Spoon.

Silver Spoon's best friend, Sweetie Belle, and her mommy, Rarity, worked in the cotton fields, leaving Silver Spoon under the watchful eye of Sugarcoat, the slave quarter roots woman.

Some said that Sugarcoat was a witch, for she worked with roots and plants to make healing potions. But Sugarcoat was kind, and children were her special joy.

On the day before Halloween Silver Spoon was strutting around the slave quarter feeling fit as a fiddle. The quarter's rude wooden cabins, fenced in by the overseer's house, the hen house, the barn, and the cotton house was Silver Spoon's world.

For Silver Spoon's new doll baby. She careful! reached into her breach pocket and took out her yearly ration of three buttons.

She sewed two of the buttons on the doll's face. Then she returned the last button egg to her pocket. Sugarcoat slipped a small dedicator bag around the doll's neck to ward off sickness, and she handed it to Silver Spoon.

As the small girl cradled the doll, a dark cloud rolled across the sky. Silver Spoon looked up and asked, "Sugarcoat, what is thunder?"

"Chile, thunder is the movin' of God's feets across the sky. And the lightning' is the wrinkling' of his eye," Sugarcoat answered.

"Sugarcoat, when will i be" Silver Spoon asked.

"When you can read your title clear to the mansion in the sky" Sugarcoat whispered. "Now hush, chile, those words can bring you trouble past tellin."

Later, as the sun slipped slowly down the sky. Sugarcoat said, "When day clean come, it's All Hallows' Eve. On Halloween witches, ghosties, and all manner of beasties is about. But the worst creature of them all is the Jack Muh Lantern."

"Jack Muh Lantern? What's a Jack Muh Lantern, Sugarcoat?" Silver Spoon asked fearfully as she held her doll close to her.

"Well, chile, the Jack Muh Lantern is this terrible creature who wanders dusk to dawn with its lantern, through woods and marshes seeking to lead people to they's destruction. The Jack Muh Lantern is a hideous little bein' somewhat like people in form, but covered with hair like a dog. It has great googly google eyes and no lips, just a big wide gash, open from ear to ear. In height it ain't more than four or five feet and it is skinnier 'n a board. But oh, the Jack Muh Lantern has magic powers. It has the power of locomotion. You can't overtake it or escape from it, once it got you in its power, for it can leap higher'n a grasshopper to most any distance. And its strength is beyond all human resistance. Ten men couldn't rassle a Jack Muh Lantern to the dirt. It don't bite or tear its victims. No, it's worser than that.

The Jack Muh Lantern leads you into the bogs and marshes and leaves you there to slowly sink and slowly die."

"Oh, ohh," Silver Spoon said, her eyes as big as hoecakes.

"There ain't no power here on earth to save you once the Jack Muh Lantern's got you in its clutches. The onliest thing that a body can do to protect hisself is take off his outer garment and put it on again inside out. Then the foul fiend is instantly deprived of all power to harm," Sugarcoat finished.

"Wells, I'm staying away from that creature," Silver Spoon said, shuddering. She went back to playing with her new baby doll.

The slaves were returning from the cotton fields. Silver Spoon saw her mother and father marching in the line.

"Sister, I'll sees you in the morning. I'se gonna remember "bout that Jack Muh Lantern," Silver Spoon said.

The next afternoon. Sugarcoat said to Silver Spoon, "Chile, I gots to send you on an errand.

I wants you to go to Miss Cathereen's and ask if she could see her way clear to give me a pinch of sassafras roots. And chile, trouble is looking for you! Stay on the path an' out of them woods!" Sugarcoat warned.

"Yes'm. I ain't lookin' for no trouble doin's with no Jack Muh Lantern," said a very meek Silver Spoon.

Silver Spoon started down the road with one thing on her mind;

"Miss Cathereen's, Miss Cathereen's." But it wasn't long before she started to wander.

"Huh, that ole Jack Muh Lantern best stay away from me" she boasted. Feeling brave, she started singing: "Old Black Bull come down de hollow He shake his tail, you hear him bellow When he bellow he jar de river he paw de earth, he make it quiver Who zen John, Who za Who zen John, Who za."

She wandered boldly into the woods. In the cool of the woods there was a beautiful red flower. And then a started to tease, playing butterfly tag.

After a while Silver Spoon noticed the sun sliding down the sky. "Oh no" she said. "Sugarcoat is goin' to be so cross with me. Then she gasped, "It's Halloween." Her heart started pounding.

Silver Spoon hurried up, tout which way had she come? Was it toward that tree or through that small clearing? She wasn't sure She stopped and crouched near a large rock. She hadn't heard any footsteps tout her skin toegan to crawl. She felt someone was near.

Silver Spoon looked behind her: nobody there. She looked to the right side: nobody there She looked to the left side: nobody there.

She turned to face front again, and there it was! A wild-looking, mannish creature with bulging eyes: the Jack Muh Lantern!

Silver Spoon turned, picked up her heels and took off. But there it was still in front of her!

Silver Spoon was scared. She tried to remember what it was that Sugarcoat had told her about the onliest way to get away from the Jack Muh Lantern. But, she couldn't catch her breath, she couldn't think! She kept running, dipping and dodging this way then that. But it was no use. That Jack Muh Lantern was always there.

Finally, she couldn't run anymore. The hushes and brambles had torn her shirt. Her arms, legs, and face were all scratched up. Her bare feet were bleeding. The Jack Muh Lantern came closer and closer, eager to get its prey.

The Jack Muh Lantern was so close that Silver Spoon could see clearly into its googly google eyes, eyes filled with delight that its prey was ripe for the kill. It rolled its eyes around in their bloody red sockets.

Silver Spoon was terrified. But Sugarcoat had said: "There's always a way out of no way." Thinking of Sugarcoat calmed her. Then Silver Spoon remembered what to do.

Silver Spoon swiftly took off her jacket and put in on inside out.

At that same moment the Jack Muh Lantern reached out to touch her. But it touched her too late.

"Eheeeeeheheh!" it screeched. "Eheeeeeheheh!" And it ran off toward the marshes still screaming, "Eheeeeeheheh! Eheeeeeheheh! Eheeeeeheheh!"

Silver Spoon ran the opposite way. She ran and ran until she could run no more. Then, Hee collapsed at the Bottom of the moss-covered tree. She want to lie there on the cool moss forever, but slowy, he stood up. She had to find our way to the woods.

Crying as she walked, with her jacket on inside out, Silver Spoon found the search party that had been sent to look for her.

Silver Spoon's mother grabbed her. "My baby girl is all right!" she cried. Her best friend kissed her tear stained cheeks.

Sugarcoat handed Silver Spoon her baby doll. She held Silver Spoon last and the longest.

Silver Spoon sobbed, "Sugarcoat, i'm sorry. Do you still loves me?"

Sugarcoat answered, "Chile, I couldn't loves you any more if you was the worst or the best one or about the special one. If I loved you any more my heart would break."

Silver Spoon's best friend picked her up. Sugarcoat and Rarity on either side. The rest of were the search party followed singing:

"There's no rain to wet you Oh yes, I want to go home There's no sun to burn you Oh yes, I want to go home Oh yes, I want to go home."

THE END


End file.
